With increased international travel, many carriers, particularly airlines, have placed great emphasis on the language expertise of their attendants. Airlines are particularly sensitive to differing passenger profiles, which vary according to route and season, and attempt in many cases to concentrate cabin attendants with particular language skills on flights to and from the corresponding destination. For example, an airline based in an English speaking country but flying into or out of Italy might endeavour to ensure that all cabin attendants speak Italian.
Further, announcements broadcast over the public address system within an aircraft are commonly repeated in multiple languages. For a carrier based in an English speaking country, these might be English, the language of the place of origin of the flight and the language of the destination of the flight. Some countries, on the other hand, have more than one national language, and all such announcements will generally be repeated in each of these.
However, most airlines have insufficient crew or attendants with foreign language expertise to handle both the numbers of passengers with foreign language demands and the diversity of those foreign languages. In some cases this difficulty is exacerbated by hiring criteria which limit the pool of adequately qualified crew and attendants, as language ability is only one recruitment criterion amongst many.
In addition, many passengers (particularly if elderly or infrequent travelers) are hesitant to seek assistance, whether by pressing a “call button” and attracting the attention of fellow passengers or otherwise, even if adequate language support is available. They may be embarrassed by what they see as calling attention to themselves, or as demanding more than they are entitled to.
Further, playing announcements in multiple languages over the public address system annoys some passengers, who must wait until all the languages versions are complete before they can return to reading, working or partaking of in-flight entertainment. In addition, foreign-language speaking passengers may feel that they are accorded a lower priority, being informed in their native language only after the principal language version (such as the English version) and possibly other foreign-language versions have been completed.